Dying to be green

I'll not bore you with the thought process which lead me to my current conundrum but it occurred to me that my death, when it comes, will have an impact on the planet's atmosphere if I'm not very careful. We're all destined for landfill of sorts after all. Before your eyebrows migrate to the nape of your neck, this began more as a thought experiment than an eco-crusade.

Put simply, we're 18% carbon as we stand, but when we lie down to sleep for the last time it'll all be released as we rot. I'm only 11 stone so that's one run to the shops in a Fiat Panda in Co2 terms but there are an awful lot of us around. 7 Billion trips to ASDA worth of rotting corpses is a bit more of a problem.

It's not an easy one to solve either. My first thought was encapsulation. Bury me in Tupperware! But then there's all that oil and water to make the plastic and the inevitable junk male which would come from the production of a click-lock casket (I can see the JML ad now). Ditto glass. All that heat required to make me into a giant paperweight. Concrete, another candidate chucks out huge amounts of carbon dioxide as it sets so that';s an eco-no-no too. Nelson was pickled in brandy to preserve his body for the return trip from Trafalgar (Third class really meant something back then) but again, vineyards, wooden casks, transit costs and the fermentation process are hardly carbon neutral. Cremation's the worst of all. Most of the ovens are natural gas fired and would release my carbon faster than mouldering in the grave.

When you start analysing what makes carbon dioxide it really does get tricky. How do you dispose of a human without the funeral service being drowned out by the tutting of environmentalists.

I have however hit upon a plan which I think you'll agree ticks most of the boxes. I shall plant a rubber tree and harvest the sap until It's time to clock out. It'll bind up C02 itself and the resulting gluey mess can be used to encase my remains upon exit. Thus shrink-wrapped I shall ask to be transported north, by sailing boat of course, to the frozen wastes of the polar ice-cap where bacteria fear to tread. On arrival, dig me a hole. Deep frozen, my carbon should be safe and my neutrality in the cycle quite literally preserved.

Simple as that.

Thought for the day: The amount of Co2 generated by the computers used to compile this blog and for you to read it have made the plan utterly pointless.